Directed by Richard Robinson
My rating: 2.5 stars out of 4
IMDb
(Blu-ray, HD Cinema Classics)
Leslie Uggams, more or less playing herself, is a pop singer on vacation whose car breaks down on a remote road. She walks to a nearby restaurant and bar where she first meets "Eddie": an Elvis impersonator with no talent and a creepy smile. He lives off the money of the bar owner, Shelley Winters, a middle-aged, alcoholic ex-nightclub singer in love with the much younger Eddie. There is also "Keno", an employee who is overprotective of Shelley and hates Eddie. Uggams has no choice but to spend the night in one of the cabins, where she is soon raped by Eddie. She manages to escape with the help of Keno and find the police, but they have no sympathy and hold a mock trial in a VFW Hall where she is stripped in front of the locals. Uggams, trapped in redneck hell, is repeatedly raped, then forced to marry Eddie in a bizarre ceremony that ends in violence. A disturbing expose of racism, misogyny and corruption in the South, although it occasionally crosses the line of good taste.
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